“I find it staggering that a proton enzyme that we have known for so many decades is responsible for maintaining such a crucial phenomenon on Earth.” Via QuantaMagazine
whose mission is to enhance public understanding of science by covering research developments and trends in mathematics and the physical and life sciences.finally pins down the source of this unparalleled photosynthetic efficiency, which has long baffled scientists. The new research found that some phytoplankton are equipped with an extra internal membrane that carries a “proton pump” enzyme that supercharges their ability to convert carbon dioxide into other substances.
Surprisingly, that photosynthetic innovation seems to have evolved by chance from a membrane protein that was originally used for digestion in the ancestor of the phytoplankton. In addition to explaining the cells’ prowess at photosynthesis, the new work helps to confirm the theory that those phytoplankton arose through a symbiotic alliance between a protozoan and a resilient red alga.
“I find it staggering that a proton enzyme that we have known for so many decades is responsible for maintaining such a crucial phenomenon on Earth,” said, a cell biologist at Harvard Medical School who studies the functions of membrane proteins and was not involved in the study. Researchers knew that certain classes of phytoplankton—diatoms, dinoflagellates, and coccolithophores—stand out for their exceptional photosynthetic abilities. Those cells are extremely proficient at absorbing carbon dioxide from their environment and directing it to their chloroplasts for photosynthesis, but the details of why they are so good at it haven’t been very clear.
He learned that the extra membrane was widely regarded by researchers as a remnant of an ancient, failed act of digestion. Scientists hypothesized that about 200 million years ago, a predatory protozoan tried to feast on a single-celled photosynthetic alga. It enveloped the resilient alga in a membrane structure called a food vacuole to digest it, but for unknown reasons, digestion did not occur.
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